Related video about US geography and the ongoing desertification of the flyover states, which for me, someone who has never left europe in his life, has been a bit interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwJABxjcvUc
Was slightly worried to hear people thinking Ohio is at any risk of desertification is all :)
Almost all of the land owned by the federal government in the west is mostly unbuildable. It is a mix of forest land, scrub land, rock, and infertile dirt, generally with a complete lack of surface water and often not sitting on groundwater of any note. What little can be ranched often is. The idea that ownership by the federal govt is stopping rural growth out here is ridiculous.
ps. I live in rural New Mexico, and travel widely across the western states, frequently staying on federally owned land.